History

The origin of aerospace engineering can be traced back to the aviation pioneers around the late 19th to early 20th centuries, although the work of Sir George Cayleydates from the last decade of the 18th to mid-19th century. In December 1903, the Wright Brothers performed the first sustained, controlled flight of a powered, heavier-than-air aircraft, lasting 12 seconds. The 1910s saw the development of aeronautical engineering through the design of World War I military aircraft.

Between World Wars I and II, great leaps were made in the field, accelerated by the advent of mainstream civil aviation. Notable airplanes of this era include the Curtiss JN 4, the Farman F.60 Goliath, and Fokker Trimotor. A significant development in aerospace engineering came with the first operational Jet engine-powered airplane, the Messerschmitt Me 262 which entered service in 1944 towards the end of the second World War. The first definition of aerospace engineering appeared in February 1958, considering the Earth’s atmosphere and outer space as a single realm, thereby encompassing both aircraft and spacecraft under the newly coined term aerospace.

In response to the USSR launching the first satellite, Sputnik, into space on October 4, 1957, U.S. aerospace engineers launched the first American satellite on January 31, 1958. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was founded in 1958 as a response to the Cold War. In 1969, Apollo 11, the first manned space mission to the moon took place. It saw three astronauts enter orbit around the Moon, with two, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, visiting the lunar surface. The third astronaut, Michael Collins, stayed in orbit to rendezvous with Armstrong and Aldrin after their visit.

On December 21, 1988, the Antonov An-225 Mriya cargo aircraft commenced its first flight. It holds the records for the world’s heaviest aircraft, heaviest airlifted cargo, and longest airlifted cargo, and has the widest wingspan of any aircraft in operational service. On October 25, 2007, the Airbus A380 made its maiden commercial flight from Singapore to Sydney, Australia. This aircraft was the first passenger plane to surpass the Boeing 747 in terms of passenger capacity, with a maximum of 853. Though development of this aircraft began in 1988 as a competitor to the 747, the A380 made its first test flight in April 2005.